August 18, (THEWILL) – The Federal Government on Thursday, insisted that there will be no salary payments for members of the striking Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), for the periods they did not work.
The Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu, stated this at the Ministerial Media Briefing, organised by the Presidential Communications Team on Thursday, at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
Adamu insisted that the Federal government will not pay salaries for the periods they will stay away from work, adding that the measure is aimed at deterring others who may contemplate similar strikes in the future.
Recall that members of ASUU had insisted on being paid the backlog of salaries withheld over the ongoing strike, as part of their demands for returning to work.
Adamu lamented that the ongoing strike by the university-based unions came despite the N6.3 trillion expended on education by the present administration directly, as well as by agencies such as TEFFUND and UBEC, on recurrent and capital projects
Adamu said the University Peculiar Personnel and Payroll System (U3PS) and the University Transparency Accountability Solution (UTAS), outscored the Integrated Personnel Payroll and Information System (IPPIS) during the integrity tests conducted, affirming that ASUU ‘s peculiarities will be accommodated in whatever platform that may be adopted.
The Minister disclosed that five of the university-based unions will likely call off their strike within the next one week, while that of ASUU is not certain.
He explained that the government rejected ASUU’s demand to be paid the salary backlog because it believes that there have to be penalties for their action.
According to him, President Muhammadu Buhari rejected it outrightly when he presented the report to him.
He explained that “all contentious issues between the government and ASUU had been settled except the quest for members’ salaries for the period of the strike be paid, a demand that Buhari has flatly rejected.”
The Minister said it is important for the public to be aware that “the Federal Government is paying the salaries of every staff in its tertiary institutions, academic and non-academic staff, while these institutions are also in full control of their internally generated revenue (IGR)”.
Adamu said the President’s position had been communicated to the lecturers who are being awaited to call off the strike, adding that Buhari’s rejection of ASUU’s requests was to curb the excesses of trade unions.
The Minister further disclosed that the University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS) payment system proposed by ASUU has outscored the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) already in use by the government and which the lecturers are kicking against.
He also revealed that the IPPIS has been updated to now accommodate the payment of those on sabbatical.
“Just one thing that I was reminded of, even the current IPPIS has been made to accommodate sabbatical. I didn’t know this. Somebody just told me.”
Recall the lecturers had accused the government of not considering the peculiarities of tertiary institutions in the IPPIS.
Adamu also debunked the report that UTAS had been approved by the government as the payment platform for University lecturers.
He said that the government has proposed a new salary structure for the unions which he said the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian University (SSANU), the Non-Academic Staff Union of Universities and Allied Institutions (NASU) and the National Association of Academic Technologists, (NAAT), have accepted in principle and are now consulting with their members with a view to call off the strike in the next one month.
He, however, commended the Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics (ASUP) for calling off its own strike.
The Minister also noted that it is the responsibility of ASUU to compensate students for the time wasted during the six-month strike, not the Federal Government.
Adamu suggested that the affected students should “take ASUU to court” to claim damages incurred over the strike period.
According to him, the federal government bears no liability to compensate millions of students grounded for six months over lost time, saying that if the students are determined to get compensated, they should take ASUU to court.
“We are doing everything humanly possible to conclude the negotiations. It is our hope that the outcome of the renegotiations will bring lasting industrial peace to our campuses. In the meantime, I am sure that the current efforts would yield the desired results and return our children back to school.”
Adamu also called for a crackdown on perpetrators of examination malpractice, which he said has been covered to be a cartel.
He called on the examiners to work closely with law enforcement agencies to “crackdown on examination malpractice”.
According to him, despite efforts to raise the integrity of the examination system in schools nationwide, the Ministry still grapples with malpractice perpetrated both at the exams councils and school levels.
He lauded the Joint Admissions Matriculation Board (JAMB) for its efforts at stemming malpractice, saying more work needed to be done.
The minister also said that the Buhari administration has expended a total of N6,003,947,848,237 in capital and recurrent expenditure in the education sector in the last seven years.
He said this was in addition to interventions from TETFund and UBEC amounting to N2.5 trillion and N553,134,967,498 respectively, in capital investment.
“We must also note and appreciate the huge investments from States and the private sector at all levels of our educational system. We will continue to improve on the implementation of the Ministerial Strategic Plan (MSP) all through to 2023 for the overall development of the education sector and the Nigerian nation.
“We will continue to create the necessary enabling environment to attract more and more private sector investment. We shall hand over a better education sector than we met it.”
Adamu said that the number of out-of-school children has dropped from an estimated 13 million to 6.9 million, with an impressive enrollment from online states of Kano, Kaduna, Katsina, Sokoto, Gombe, Bauchi, Adamawa, Taraba, Rivers and Ebonyi.
He linked the increased enrollment to activities of the Better Education Service Delivery for All (BESDA).
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